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Over the last ten years or so there have been a lot of initiatives to raise awareness of mental health issues in society and various organisations and institutions like hospitals, workplaces, universities, colleges, schools and even the police and prisons. How effective they have been is a matter of debate, personally I think though they may have had some effect we still have a long way to go. However, there is one area in which I think there is no awareness or understanding of mental health issues - airports.

There are many groups of people who might have genuine difficulty negotiating the current security measures at airports, which involve body scanning and intrusive pat downs among other things. People with mental health issues, autism, OCD, body issues, people who have been raped or sexually abused all might find the procedures carried out at airports traumatic. But the policies at airports focus all on security but not at all on the mental wellbeing of passengers. This lack of understanding of mental health issues has resulted in the loss of life before now. In December 2005 at Miami International Airport, a man exhibiting behaviour that caused concern to onlookers was shot dead by skymarshals while his partner was trying to explain that he had mental health problems. He was found to have bi-polar disorder and had not been taking his medication. In August 2006 a plane was escorted down by fighter jets when a mentally ill woman caused a disturbance on board.

I have written a blog about childhood experiences which I felt sexually violated by, which I link here http://miadotcom.wordpress.com/2012/12/02/how-being-forced-to-use-communal-changing-rooms-at-school-affected-me/ and can imagine there will be other people like myself who feel too afraid to travel or people who have been affected by the current measures at airports. I am disappointed that mental health organisations and organisations representing vulnerable groups have not spoken out on this issue yet and would be interested in hearing from anyone who is interested in helping raise awareness of this issue.

My father has a medical condition that is private and he has not shared with me, yet there is evidence of it from his last visits to my residence over a span of years. My father has told me that due to the invasive nature of scanners and pat downs he will never travel by flying again. People have the right of integrity of their bodies and privacy and should not be violated under the guise of security.

No one needs to suffer from mental illness to have issues with airport security. Anyone that honors their personal dignity and respect for boundaries should have issues with airport security. It is not okay for strangers to touch bodies as airport screeners do without express permission. It is not okay to demand that physical access under duress as a condition of travel. Emotionally strong people understand this, and demand that their personal boundaries be respected. Personally, I believe that everyone should take a stand enforcing their physical boundaries... if enough people did that, current invasive, uncomfortable-to-traumatic searches would be swiftly replaced with security that understood that trading safety-at-all-costs defiles and destroys human spirit and dignity.